18 November 2000
thousands at hague climate change
talks!
dike built around world
leaders!
5,000 people filled
50,000 sandbags at the UN climate change
negotiations.
The 500 metre long and 1.5 metre high dike
will stay throughout the conference to remind
UN delegates that citizens from around the
world demand that the negotiations lead to
real action to cut greenhouse gases and fight
climate change.
Klaus T–pfer, the head of
the UN Environment Programme, and Jan Pronk,
the chair of the UN climate negotiations
joined participants from Chile to the Czech
Republic in building the dike.
Banners, flags and messages from groups and
individuals from over 50 countries decorate
the dike highlighting issues such as the
principle of North - South equity and the
campaign against the inclusion of nuclear
power in the treaty.
Wijnand Duyvendak,
director of Milieudefensie (FoE Netherlands),
outlined the key demands of the dike
protesters - that the Kyoto Protocol should
address global warming through real and
permanent reductions of CO2 emissions, rather
than the rag-bag of loopholes, get-out
clauses and compromises that currently
threaten the credibility of the treaty.
Ricardo Navarro, Chair of
Friends of the Earth International said:
The politicans inside the conference centre
must listen to the citizens outside who
elected them. This dike is a symbol of the
need for a Kyoto Protocol that truly cuts
greenhouse gas emissions and is just to
countries of the South as well as the
North."
The dike is done pictures are available
here.
Friends of the Earth contacts:
Now in The Hague at the COP6 Conference:
Ian Willmore at 0044 7887 641344 (press
officer)
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